Last week's news about TSMC extending 7nm chip production lead time because of strong demand provoked knee-jerk speculation that it was the cause of AMD delaying the launch of its Ryzen 9 3950X. It has turned out that unsatisfactory clock speed - rather than foundry support - has prompted AMD to adjust the design of 16-core processor, according to sources from the motherboard suppy chain. TSMC may be indisputably the leader in the foundry sector, but China-based peers are keen to expand 12-inch fab capacity to better serve the domestic market. And China-based chip vendors are also eyeing the 5G mobile SoC market. The entry-level to mid-tier 5G mobile SoC market segment will see particularly intense competition.

More 12-inch wafer fabs come online in China: China-based foundries including Hua Hong Semiconductor, CanSemi Technology, and memory startup ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT) have recently started operating their new 12-inch wafer fabs in the country, where more new 12-inch fabs are expected to come online by 2020, according to industry sources.

Chipmakers eyeing entry-level to mid-tier 5G SoC market: The entry-level to mid-tier SoC solution segment has become the main battlefield for winning 5G SoC orders as major chip players including Qualcomm, MediaTek and Unisoc are gearing up efforts to enhance their deployments in the segment, according to industry sources.